subst(CMD) 19 June 1992 subst(CMD) Name subst - associate a path with a drive letter Syntax subst [drive1: [drive2:]path] subst drive1: /d To display the names of the virtual drives in effect, use the following syntax: subst Description The drive letter you assign represents a virtual drive, because you can use the drive letter in commands as if it represented a physical drive. Parameters drive1: Specifies the virtual drive to which you want to assign a path. drive2: Specifies the physical drive that contains the specified path (if different from the current drive). path Specifies the path that you want to assign to a virtual drive. Switch /d Deletes a virtual drive. Notes Using other commands with subst The following commands do not work, or should not be used, on drives used in the subst command: assign diskcopy mirror backup fdisk recover chkdsk format restore diskcomp label sys Valid drive1 values The drive1 parameter must be within the range specified by the lastdrive command. If not, subst displays the following error message: Invalid parameter - drive1: Ensuring compatibility with future versions of MS-DOS To ensure compatibility with future versions of MS-DOS, you should use subst rather than the assign command. Examples The following command creates a virtual drive Z for the path B:\USER\BETTY\FORMS: subst z: b:\user\betty\forms Now, instead of typing the full path, you can reach this directory by typing the letter of the virtual drive, followed by a colon, as in the following example: z: This example works only if you have included the line lastdrive=z in your CONFIG.SYS file to define Z as the highest letter that MS-DOS recognizes as a disk drive. Related commands For information about joining a disk drive to a directory, see the join(CMD) command. For information about increasing the number of avail- able drive letters, see the lastdrive(CMD) command.